Chapter 22

Mornings on the island are so beautiful. The mornings were filled with the sounds of many birds since there were trees near the big house. The variety was amazing, as there were a couple of types of toucans, several long-billed birds, and some very noisy green macaws. Some of the birds almost were pets and often flew onto the porch to beg for treats. Mina shooed them off as fast as she could so that she didn't have to keep cleaning their droppings. She had a place out behind the kitchen where she put various pieces of fruit and vegetables for all the birds that wanted an easy meal.

While we all were having breakfast, Steve suggested we make a trip into Limon to show our Hawaiian folks the city and maybe go see the new hospital. We could have lunch at the yacht club while we were on the mainland, before coming back to the island this afternoon.

Bonita is always listening to what we're planning to do and asked, "Do you and Lisa think you'll be back to do some playing at the studio this afternoon? You know how much I enjoy doing that and I'm sure the band guys want to play too. Today is going to be a lot of the jazz you wrote when you were in high school. We never get around to it, but I've been playing it and it's really fun. You have all of the instruments written for some of the pieces, so I want to hear it all together."

"We should be back to play around some later this afternoon. That would be a good change for the resort people. Lisa and I haven't played much jazz, so this would be a good change of pace."

A very large group, that included all of my ladies, all of Steve's, all of Dewey's, and the Hawaiian folks, left for the mainland after commandeering the small island commuter. The pilot said he usually wasn't that busy in the mornings and we could probably catch him on one of his return trips in the early afternoon.

The trip isn't very long and it gave us a chance to say good morning to the crew of my big fishing yacht tied up at the club. Betty checked with the crew to make sure they had restocked food and beverages for the charter today as it would be a larger than normal group and was scheduled for all day.

Our visit to the hospital was nice. Diego had heard that we were going to tour and came along to show us around. The place was very modern and beautiful, but he said the best part was the new doctors and nurses who were getting out of school and wanted to practice here in Limon.

The next stop was to view more of the cleanup of the earthquake damage that was still taking place. From there, we visited the big resort hotel on the coast of Limon that accommodated people who didn't have reservations at the main island resort. The place was every bit as nice as the main resort, but the rooms and services were more like any other hotel you could stay at. They had added some of the female pampering facilities that made the hotel seem like an upscale place. They had pools, a beach, two golf courses, and restaurants, so it was a very nice resort, but wasn't as extravagant or as expensive as the island resort.

Lunch at the yacht club became a festive occasion. Our large group required a lot of preparation, and I had made sure to advise the restaurant on how many people would be coming. The yacht club had brought in several helpers for the kitchen and a dozen more people to wait on us.

I had ordered one of their specials for all of us. We were going to have their grilled Mahi Mahi with their special sauce on a plate filled with an assortment of fruit. I knew how delicious it was and wanted the others to enjoy it.

Our group did some damage to the liquor supply while we had a long lunch. Even the women were feeling warm and fuzzy by the time we headed to the home island. The only sober ones were the pregnant mothers. Several island women were attending to all of the babies and the older kids. You never had to worry about finding a babysitter with so many of the women wanting to do something special for us.

Back on the island, Lisa and I were being rushed to get over to the studio for the promised work to practice some jazz pieces from my past. I knew there was something up as soon as we arrived in the studio. The band guys were playing around with "The Lady is a Tramp". Something was up as not one of them would even glance my way. You could tell they were out of their league with the music, but were really trying to get the flavor of it. They kept degenerating back to a blues theme that wasn't far from jazz, but more blues kept creeping in the longer they played.

Bonita had a couple of extra keyboards out and told me that I need to be the bass for everything today. She told Lisa that the two of them would be on keyboards as I had written a lot of music for multiple keyboard sounds. I remembered that, but wondered how we were going to reproduce the sax parts that I wrote into so much of my music.

Bonita was looking at the music and was standing over near the glass where Elmer looked busy setting things up. She said out loud, "Elmer, can you do the sax parts on the controller for us on this one. Let me come and give you some of the music."

The Mistress of Music went to the door that led to the hallway and to Elmer's control room. When she opened the door, she loudly said, "Just what we need, Pops and two sax players. How did you know we needed you? Oh, there's a trumpet player and a trombone too. My goodness, we have all the instruments we need."

I was laughing along with Lisa. Kenny had a sly smile on his face as his guys sort of spread out to mix Pops guys in. Pops sat at a keyboard and said to me, "You done wrote so much funny stuff, we been practicin' your music for a week and hope we get what you wanted it to sound like."

I asked, "Should I ask how you got here? The other question is who is playing up at Sue's Blues?"

Pops grinned and said, "That good for nuttin' Rags is doing his thing with some side guys he's found. They sounded pretty good and shouldn't let the club down. Besides we're only here for two nights and then going back home. This was a command performance for our own Bonita. She planned this whole thing right up to convincing her daddy to ship us down here and back."

Bonita was grinning and said, "Okay, now that everyone is here, can we do some practicing. This first piece I handed out is like Pops said, it's fun. "Let's go through it a couple of times to see if this is what Chuck heard in his head when he wrote it."

The lead in was a Rhodes piano with some B-3 accents, followed by tenor and alto saxes doing some gentle sounds. Behind everything was a strong bass with rhythm guitars. The nutty part was along with the Rhodes and B-3 was a regular piano, or what I wrote as a bright piano all at once. There were 8 bar breaks for each keyboard and both saxes that let the bass really accent the theme.

Pops led in, with Bonita playing the bright piano and Lisa doing the B-3. The parts could be switched around as the keyboards all had many voices.

Everyone was a little off and not totally together the first time through. The second time was better, but I had to stand in front of Sticks to get him to get the right funky erratic beat that I wanted. I think Pops had spent too much time with the music since he was playing with his eyes closed. You could tell that he heard what I wrote and was really trying to get it out.

We were having fun with it by the fourth or fifth time through, and it was sounding like what had been running around in my head when I put it all down on paper. When we took a break, Pops asked me, "Do you want to make any changes now that you've heard it played the way you wrote it?"

"Maybe later, but I like it. I wrote that one night when I had heard this running around in my head at school all day. I probably wrote the theme for the bright and Rhodes keyboard in thirty minutes. I filled in the B-3, both saxes, the muted trumpet, rhythm guitar, drum, and bass in another hour. I know I kept going over each part until I realized I had it down. I showed it to our music teacher at school and he spent a day with the music and said it was too difficult for our people to do. I was really disappointed, and I couldn't get him to change his mind no matter how much I begged."

I turned to Bonita and asked, "What did you do with the vocals for this? I wrote the words for main and backup groups. I can probably redo it, but I liked the lyrics when I wrote it."

Bonita looked at me for a few long seconds, and then dug into her big salesman's sample case. She kept looking at pieces of paper until she pulled out a staff sheet with words and compared it to the bright keyboard music. "This is it, Chuck, I didn't even realize there were vocals. How complicated can you make one piece of music?"

The little lady ran into the control room and I could see her using the big copier in there to make multiple copies. She came back in and gave a copy to everyone, including the wives, Jane, and Ipo. Bonita asked, "Who should sing lead? This is too complicated for Lisa to play and sing too."

Pops was going over the lyrics then said, "Wait just a minute. I think I know just the voice we need."

The older man walked out of the studio and was back in less than five minutes, leading his wife of so many years. He pulled a stool over next to his keyboard and adjusted a directional microphone to her mouth level. He told the rest of us, "We need to play this through a couple of times so Nancy can hear it and begin getting the rhythm of the music. Nancy, Baby, you tell me when you want to begin singing. You other girls study those words and watch the music so you know when to back her up."

We played it through twice and let Nancy begin singing her lyrics along with the music. When we paused, she said, "Let me try it for real this next time through. You sure did get the harmony all over the place on this, Chuck. I feel what you want, but it's going to take all us girls some practice."

The first time through with the vocals wasn't bad, but it needed work, a lot of work. We did it again and it began coming together. The backup vocals were hitting at the right time and in harmony, so it did sound decent. A lot of the volumes can be worked on the board to get the right levels, but this was something to be played live.

Two more times through and we were sounding damn good. Nancy was grinning as she wiggled a finger for me to come closer as she sang. I was up close to her and she leaned into me as I played the very strong singing bass line. I could feel the woman singing and could feel her emotions through our body contact.

When we finished this time through, she said, "I think I'm going to have to take a time out with Pops and see if he will help this itch you've given me. That is so fun and sexy. Just how old were you when you wrote this again?"

I blushed as I told her, "I think it was the September after I turned fourteen. I loved jazz along with blues back then, and kept getting all of these crazy rhythms and music running around in my head. I went through a whole tablet of staff paper in a week. I know that I always had to go buy another couple of tablets. I liked the great big sheets, but I could usually only get the eight and a half by eleven."

"Well, Boy, you would be in deep trouble if I didn't have my man with me." The very mature lady was enjoying herself.

Pops was grinning as he said, "I knew she would love this, and I knew her Ella voice would come out. My Nancy has the sweetest pipes there is."

I told everyone, "We'll try this in front of the crowd tonight, but we need to work up something else that's easier. I don't remember, but I think some of the stuff I wrote before I graduated is worse than this, I mean more complicated, but maybe Bonita doesn't like them. We'll work on them at home one of these days."

Bonita sorted through some sheets and handed out a gentle piece that was a very sweet sax background with piano, guitar, and bass. This was traditional jazz with a little syncopated beat that sounded best with brushes. I told Pops, "This one sounds good with two keyboards playing in sync. One bright, one Rhodes sounds really good, but they have to be exactly in sync. Want to try?"

It was Pops and Bonita the first time, then Pops and Lisa. Next time it was Nita and Lisa. I surprised them when I said, "Let's have two bright and one Rhodes, and see if you three can be on top of each other."

They were perfect and able to exactly hit all the breaks. I was impressed and amazed, but the piece sounded great. It was another fun piece that had your foot going. Kenny enjoyed playing bass on this one and our band's lead guitar handled the work. That was easy to put into the can.

We worked up four more pieces that we would practice after the magic show, and I finally agreed that we might do a couple of blues tunes if we had time. We would do some of the band's cover stuff. That should do it.

Supper was some kind of awesome stew made of goat meat, various fruits, and potatoes, all in a delicious sauce. Bonita announced to everyone around the porch after supper, that we were playing some special jazz at the club tonight, and that Pops and a few boys had come to help with some of the music. The little girl said, "The best part is all of the jazz is music Chuck wrote when he was in high school. You really need to hear this."